Postmenopausalzest

Sunday, August 2, 2015

Current Affairs: A Tiara Investigations Mystery. Lane Stone. Originally released by Mainly Murder Press in 2011. Currently available on Amazon. Paper: $13.99. ISBN-13: 978-1512265385; Ebook: $4.99. ISBN-10:1512265381. 242 pp.I read this first mystery in Lane Stone’s Tiara Investigations series in 2012. Lane and I were both having our first mysteries published by Mainly Murder Press. Several of us published first by Mainly Murder have gone on to publish elsewhere. Lane says we’re MMP orphans. I say we’re graduates. MMP got us started. Lane’s second novel, Domestic Affairs, came out from Cozy Cat Press. She’s working now on her third one, Foreign Affairs. As I reread Current Affairs, I caught more of the humor and was also struck by how she plays with the Southern lady syndrome. Three former beauty queens, living in Georgia--Leigh Reed, Tara Brown, and Victoria Blair--form a detective agency which specializes in finding out what wandering husbands are up to. Their conversation and actions spoof the stereotype of the Southern lady’s proper behavior. For instance, they discuss their sex lives. All three are smart and have special skills which come in handy. Victoria left the corporate world where she learned to be a whiz at computer technology. Tara is a lawyer, and Leigh worked for the Park Service and is married to an army general. She knows the military speak for weapons technology. Yet they are, in scene after scene, whimsical and creatively mischievous. They are laid back and yet right on the money. Their side kicks are their three Standard Snauzers. Leigh’s is Abby, Tara’s is Stephie, and Victoria’s is Mr. Benz. Sometimes the dogs go out on cases with them–for defense. They don’t carry guns.The novel begins with their research into the amatory activities of local policeman Jerome Kent. When they give their photos of Kent and a very young blonde to his wife, Kent threatens to close down their private eye business, but all their paperwork is in order.David Taylor, their next client’s husband, is an engineer for a weapon the military is using. His wife Kelly says he’s out a lot at night and takes private phone calls. The Tiara three go in pursuit when he leaves his house after a phone call, but someone shoots him before they can discover who he planned to meet. The dogs chase the shooter, and Kent shows up, not thrilled to have the women involved. Naturally they turn up more information than he does, though to do so they get into ridiculous predicaments from which their imagination, skill, and whimsy extricate them.Current Affairs is loaded with humor that works. Humor writing isn’t easy to pull off. I also like the human tone, the real love Leigh has for her general husband and he for her, though she is a peace activist. Genuine affection among the three friends binds them together as much as their interest in helping women catch their errant husbands. In short, they’re outrageous, and their unlikely methods solve crimes.Once you’ve enjoyed Current Affairs, you’ll want to read Domestic Affairs. I look forward to the release of Foreign Affairs.***

Sunday, July 26, 2015

Photo taken by Lee Sauer at Malice Domestic Convention 2015.Thank you, Lee, and Rita Owen, for sending me this photo.***GIFTS XXV.January 18, 2015I see how I am living inthe right place, giving like watergives, seeking truth, serving others well, timing my acts to gothrough defenses, and when peoplefight with me, go around, let it go.It takes two to fight. I will not rejectthose who reject me. Bertha usedto tell her sons, “You’ll need mebefore I’ll need you.” They allcame to her funeral. Let us all emulate water. I know that I know how.–Gifts XXIV.I’m still walking my leyline pathwithout a cane. Three doctors wantedme to use a cane. “I can’t farm witha cane,” I said. True, once I fellagainst one of my raised beds, butit cushioned me as if the earth were my mother’s breast. I do remembermy mother’s breast. It had a certainsmell when she held me close androcked me. She aged well, livedto be ninety-four and hiked theSmokies to eighty-six. Agingdoes test us: how to stay healthyand independent? I still work a sixteen-hour day but rest moreoften. My creative mind worksmore effectively and easily thanit ever has. I learn new thingsmore slowly; need more aids tomemory, where riches are stored and names are elusive. Peoplesurprise me by saying, “You’rethe lady who walks your dogon the dam road.” “Yes.”I cut firewood until the saw burnedout. I see the daffodils penetratingtheir leaf cover. I must removethe dead cosmos and zinnia stalks and fertilize the gardenswhere crocus and more daffodilsare being stirred awake by winterrain. The hens begin laying fouror five eggs instead of only one.Slowly I’ll learn what I needto know, cut wood again, receiveand plant new seeds. Order babychicks. If I want to flourish manymore years, I must keep doingwhat I love when it’s harder.How do I quiet the worry offriends and doctors? I’ll say,“If I have a crutch, I’ll becomedependent on it, and then I won’tflourish as I do now. Let medemonstrate my independenceand courage, grow my food, sawmy wood, raise chickens, writemy books. You see this is mypath. Statistics don’t help mefor I am unique in my being, mylifestyle, and in the way I walk whileI flourish. If I defy gravity, so be it.Observe me, and learn.”***

Sunday, July 19, 2015

Judy with new no coal ash sign in downtown Moncure on July 16.***THE OMENS ARRIVE XVIII.July 12, 2015It’s all work, work. The curse of Adam. But if he doesn’t work, he doesn’t get anything, even love. He just tumbles about in hell and bashes himself and burns himself and stabs himself. The fallen man–nobody’s going to look after him. The poor bastard is free–a free and responsible citizen...” Gulley Jimson in The Horse’s Mouth by Joyce CaryWhen the soil is rich and friable, seeds thrive, but so do weeds.Crawling down the carrot rowbetween hardy grass stalks, looking for those lacy fronds, I dig around their orange tops, pull loose fat carrots. My best carrot crop everif I can find it. Everywhere this hot whimsical summer the weedshave flourished. I work daily to savethe food I need for winter. Therewere raspberries. There will be figs.I dig out rampant grass and weedtangles to make space for okra andbean seeds. First heat and drought,then too much rain. There will betomatoes, though they fell overin their wire cages. The coal ashwar goes on. Farmers fight wars,too, to keep their plants alive, outwit voles and beetles, provide water,protect ripening fruit. In the beginningI never expected everything I plantedto bear fruit or come into flower.At least in a garden you know what todo even if you can’t do it fast enough.Aging slows me, makes me reluctantto encounter too hot sun. True, I can’t do as much as I did sixteen years ago,but with work, thought, and care Ican help my vegetables, fruits, and flowers come into their own. Fightingcorporate power and arrogance is subtler work, takes ingenuity, humility, and confidence in our human power to defend and protect what wecherish, who we are, our lives andhomes, farms, and children.I must keep my vision clear,do what my heart says do.***

These trees were killed almost entirely during our last two severe winters. This is how they looked in August, 2011. Other figs, though, are producing this year. What a gift is a fig.

Sunday, July 12, 2015

Photo by Martha Girolami***THE OMENS ARRIVE XVII. July 5, 2015Some omens wake us up. Stillhalf-asleep, I enter the coop to feedthe hens and discover a huge blacksnake coiled inches from the chicksunder their heat lamp. I take a rakeand urge the big hens outside, lock the chicken door, raise the door to the room where the chicks cower in the corner and the snake takes its ease. I rake it out and shut that door, then open the people door to force it outside. It disappears intothe straw, and I assume it left the way it entered. Then i sprinkle lime aroundoutside of the coop. It ate two chicks.I feed and water the fourteen left, andgradually they resume their normalcheeping mode. That night, closingthem up, again under their heat lamp,I find the snake cozily coiled in a nesting box. I rake it out and it againslips in with the babies. Angry now,I rake it out. One chick runs out,and I slip her in my raincoat pocket.The snake begins climbing, tries allits tricks, but, frantic now, adrenalinpumping, heart pounding, I hit thesnake, finally lifting it out of the coop.Where it lies in the dirt, I stab it againand again with the rake’s tines. Finallyit flows into the bamboo grass whereonce grew parsley. I replace the chickand refresh their water and feed. Thebig hens had fled to the top of thechick room and watched me fighttheir deadly enemy. The babe liesstill. Did I smother her? Exhausted,I return to the house, calm myself. I’vedone all I can. Did I save all fourteenchicks? Did the snake die or only getindigestion? The coal ash moverand shaker Charah had rented theempty building in our village. Howlike the snake coiled among the chicks.Will I need my rake again for thiscorporate snake? I’ll need my words,my ingenuity, and my courage. A different war but the goal is the same:save what is precious and threatened:our community. Fight. Hope. Love each other.*** On July 6, 2015 our local environmental groups, Chatham Citizens Against Coal Ash Dump, EnvironmentaLEE, and Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League began our legal challenge of two permits issued by our N.C. Dept of Environment and Natural resources (DENR). We go to law to defend ourselves from harm from 12 million tons of coal ash being shipped into our two communities in Brickhaven (southeast Chatham) and Colon Road (northern Lee County).***

Raleigh-
Charging
that the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) acted
arbitrarily and capriciously by issuing permits for two proposed coal ash dumps
in Lee and Chatham Counties, the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League
(BREDL), Chatham Citizens Against Coal Ash Dump (CCACAD), and EnvironmentaLEE
(ELEE) filed a petition for a contested case hearing with the Office of
Administrative Hearings (OAH) today.

BREDL
community organizer Therese Vick stated “Communities targeted for coal ash
disposal deserve a regulatory agency that has their best interests at heart, not
what is in the best interest of Duke Energy. DENR had sufficient reason to deny
the permits, and they did not.” CCACAD president Judy Hogan commented on the
challenge filed today saying, “We are very happy to
have filed this appeal to challenge the mining and solid waste permits which
DENR released without paying attention to its own rules to protect us.”
Debbie Hall, vice-president of ELEE explained why they felt this step was
necessary, “We
chose to join in the complaint because we believe that any citizen who feels an
action will significantly impact their lives in a negative way has the right to
oppose that action. We still believe in grassroots efforts, and that those
efforts can make a difference in the outcome.”

Issues
raised in the petition include:

·The actions
allowed by the permits would have a significant and adverse impact on the health
and well-being of the members of the petitioners, and
on their families, the use and enjoyment of their property, the value of their
property and other economic interests.

·DENR’s issuance of
the Permit has substantially prejudiced the rights of the Petitioners and their
members. By issuing the permits, the state agencies exceeded their authority or
jurisdiction; acted erroneously; failed to use proper procedure; acted
arbitrarily or capriciously; and failed to act as required by law or rule.

·The proposed sites
are solid waste landfills, rather than mine reclamation projects, and
should be regulated as such.

·The requirements
for compliance with other laws for the protection of the environment should
be examined for all of corporate partners of Green Meadow, LLC.

·Environmental
Justice: DENR did not investigate, or require the
applicants to investigate, the cumulative impacts on the communities.

According to John Runkle, attorney for the plaintiffs, the petition was filed to
“ensure that all regulations are complied with." Filing a petition for a
contested case through the Office of Administrative Hearings is the first step
in challenging an agency decision.

The Blue Ridge
Environmental Defense League was founded in 1984. The organization has a
thirty-year track record of victories over polluting facilities.

Our NC state government allowed Duke Energy, our only electricity generating power company, to ignore local governments. Ours in Chatham, unfortunately, felt
powerless and signed an agreement with Duke, which gives them some leverage
after it’s here. We find that unacceptable and are glad Diana Hales and Karen
Howard voted against it. We intend to stop it by all available means, including
civil disobedience if need be. We are raising money to pay our wonderful lawyer. We need help wherever you live, if you imagine our plight here and want to help. This is genocide, and we won’t stand it. Stand with us and
contribute whatever you can. No amount is too small. There’s a web way to
give:

https://www.crowdrise.com/coalashfightagainstdukeenergy
. On this one you can be a anonymous. These gifts are
tax-deductible as we are a chapter of BREDL and tax-exempt 501-C-3. We’d be very
grateful for your help. We are not a rich community here in Moncure. Thanks,
Judy Hogan

Sunday, July 5, 2015

As Night Falls. Jenny Milchman. Ballantine-Random House, June 30, 2015. ISBN-978-0-553-39481-8. Hardcover $26. 367 pp.Jenny Milchman’s third novel, As Night Falls, adds another play to what could be a dramatic trilogy. All three of her suspense novels take place in Wedeskyull, in the Adirondacks. Each one features a woman who comes to be and feel alone in an overwhelmingly terrifying situation. In each case the woman, who had been relying on others for support and comfort, must go it alone. She gradually takes on what fate has handed her. This transformation alone is worth the read. Like the figure of Antigone in the ancient Greek drama based on the Oedipus myth, she defies the forces marshaled against her.Milchman is a master at building suspense slowly but surely. The confrontation with the killer is only part of the story and is deftly woven into the fabric of a family drama. Milchman explores all the nuances of the emotional states her characters pass through. In this novel the main action takes place in twenty-four hours, another bow to the Greek playwrights.Sandy Tremont, her husband Ben, and their fifteen-year-old daughter Ivy are living what passes these days for a normal middle-class life. Sandy works as a therapist in a hospital clinic. Ben has his own company that features Off Road Adventures, such as skiing off the trails, free-climbing, or biking. He seems to need that kind of scary stimulation. All Sandy wants is family peace, but her daughter Ivy prefers to fight with her and knocks Sandy for a loop by calling her a liar. Sandy never lied to Ivy, intent on having a close bond with her, but she doesn’t want Ben to know anything bad about Ivy, like the lying accusation or the failing paper Ivy brought home from school to be signed. She says to Ivy, “We won’t tell Daddy.”Interwoven with pre-dinner evening rituals with this family, we meet the prisoners Nick and Harlan, who are out this cold day on a road assignment. Nick is planning their escape though none has been successful since he entered this prison twenty-four years earlier. They do succeed in jumping into a large SUV driven by a woman who follows the orders to drive to Long Hill Road in Wedeskyull. When she stops and then jumps from the car and runs into the woods, Nick orders his huge but not intelligent friend Harlan to go after her and kill her. Harlan doesn’t want to kill anyone, and Nick has to consider that, despite Harlan’s loyalty to him, he might turn against Nick. Nevertheless he forces Harlan to stab her with a nail file, and they get away and head toward the place where Nick intends to get supplies before going deep into the woods north toward Canada, where he’s sure they’ll never be found.The cold and the oncoming snowstorm might be a problem, but Nick summons his old confidence and they drive to the home of Sandy, Ben, and Ivy. While building the suspense, Jenny also flashes back to Nick’s mother Barbara, who was entranced by her beautiful, willful son from birth and fears his tantrums even before age three.We also visit Ivy, sulking and lonely, in her bedroom with the dog Mac, with whom she has been raised, and whose fur she cries into when she can get none of her friends to come over or text with her. She is then answering a text from a new friend named Cory, who has asked her to go out with him, and she has said yes, when she hears the front door bang open.Nightmare enters this mostly peaceful family’s world, its dynamics only a little dysfunctional because of feelings repressed, truths not told, old secrets buried.Nick’s family, we already know, has been very dysfunctional, as the therapists say. His mother is obsessed with her beautiful, smart, and tempestuous son. All his misbehavior, including a streak of cruelty, is whitewashed by this Jocaste figure, who continues to believe he is creative and sensitive. Her Nicky ends up in prison for murder. We understand by the time the two escapees arrive at Sandy’s house that little Nicky has become a cold-blooded killer, and his friend Harlan’s brute strength is his chief weapon.The Oedipus myth, which Sigmund Freud brought into the discipline of psychotherapy, stands behind the three heroines of Jenny’s books, for all resemble Antigone in their lonely fight for justice against huge odds. Antigone was the daughter of Oedipus by his mother, Jocaste. When Oedipus put his eyes out upon realizing he’d killed his father and married his mother, Antigone accompanied him when he left Thebes. When Creon took over the Theban throne, Antigone’s two brothers fought and killed each other. Creon would not allow one of them to be buried, and Antigone buried him despite the king’s order. Her name means “against the seed,” i.e, the male. You could say she was an early feminist. In As Night Falls, the mother-son duo of Nick and his mother Barbara is the original Oedipal story/myth/complex made quite contemporary. Who hasn’t met grown men obsessed with their mothers who never saw any faults in them. The resulting adults can’t take in the psychic reality of other people and their feelings.This story is a grand interruption by the gods as a modern, middle class family has to cope with the nightmare of having two killers invade their home. There are, as well, many flashbacks, in which we learn the story of the original dysfunctional family, that of Nick, his parents, and sister. Sandy and Ben’s buried secrets and fears emerge when they are fighting to survive any way they can.Jenny has worked as a therapist, and her vision of the family insists that, for harmony and good feelings, all those fears and secrets need to be out in the open so that healing and forgiveness can take place. Is it possible to go through the nightmare this story is for its main characters and come out a whole, functional family? Jenny thinks so and knows how to write a compelling story that’s believable both in its terror and in its optimism.***

***Jenny Milchman is the author of Cover of Snow, which won the Mystery Writers of America’s Mary Higgins Clark Award, Ruin Falls, and As Night Falls. She is the chair of International Thriller Writers’ Debut Authors program, a member of the Mystery Writers of America and New York Writers Workshop, and the creator and organizer of Take Your Child to a Bookstore Day, which is celebrated annually in all fifty states. Milchman lives in the Hudson Valley with her familyjennymilchman.comtakeyourchildtoabookstore, org

Sunday, June 28, 2015

Murder in the Corn Maze by Gloria Alden, Willow Knoll Publishing, 2015. ISBN 9781511747264, 317 pp. $14.95. Murder in the Corn Maze is Gloria Alden’s fifth Catherine Jewell gardening mystery set in Portage Falls, Ohio. This one features a local Halloween tradition of setting up a variation on the haunted house custom in a corn field, creating a maze with witches, ghosts, vampires, and zombies scattered through the cornfield of a local farm. Alden’s books are gentle traditional mysteries even if the killer uses a pitchfork or an axe. As many traditional mysteries are, these are set in a village, but Alden’s own vision of village life is what her novels grow out of. Her vision reminds me of my Russian friend’s saying that the best place to “build the human soul” is in the village. I’ve pondered what he meant. In a village we are known, for good or bad. Even if our good deeds are done quietly, they become known because we check on each other and talk about each other. Other people also take responsibility for us. It has been said that it takes a village to raise a child. In a village people reach out to those in need whether because they need funds for an operation or clothing and furniture because their house burned down. They also notice if certain teenagers are harming others and alert their neighbors.In Portage Falls two new residents who open an auto repair shop combined with a coffee shop are targeted by a little teen gang of mischief makers, and nasty anti-gay slogans are painted on their storefront. Everyone in town figures out quickly who did it, and the one teen likely to be responsible is Trent Lawrence who bullies his friends Todd Williams and Ryan O’Brien, and all three are encouraged in their ugly behavior by their English teacher and drama coach Dale Bryant.A pastor of a local church and part-time police office, gathers his parishioners to clean up the mess for the two new residents. The local police chief, John MacDougal, already has his eye on Trent and hopes to stop him before he does any more damage. He and other villagers hold Trent’s parents partly responsible for not curbing their son’s malicious behavior and for having spoiled him. Catherine had met the boys when she was helping her art teacher friend Maggie Fiest work on the costumes for the Corn Maze. The main characters have already assessed the danger this little gang is to an essentially peaceful community.The murder occurs during the first evening of the corn maze. It’s puzzling because the victim is the “coach” of the village bullies. Catherine has her brother with her for the maze, and it’s her friend Maggie who finds the body shortly after the murder. Catherine vows to stay out of this investigation, and knows her brother Michael and her boyfriend, the police chief, want her to, but if Maggie is suspected, she’ll have to get involved.These villagers are essentially law-abiding. When newcomers arrive, they are checked out, and word spreads about them, be it good or bad. In Alden’s vision of the village, the goal is to restore the peace and safety of the community. As people’s foibles become known, they are teased, but if they do harm, they are punished, and yet the hope of redemption hovers, if the culprit will mend his ways. In this series, the lead characters, Catherine and John MacDougal, are like the king and queen of a mythical village. He is just and responsible, but fully human, and she lives out her compassion, readily admitting to her own foibles. Alden knows her small towns well, and she invents characters we can love and admire as well as those who disrupt the equanimity of the village and must be punished. ***

Gloria Alden writes the Catherine Jewell Mystery series: The Blue Rose, Daylilies for Emily’s Garden, Ladies of the Garden Club, The Body in the Goldenrod, Murder in the Corn Maze, and a middle-grade book, The Sherlock Holmes Detective Club. Her published short stories include: “Cheating on Your Wife Can Get You Killed,” winner of the Love is Murder contest, “Mincemeat is for Murder”: and “The Body in the Red Silk Dress” in Bethlehem Writers Roundtable, “The Professor’s Books” in Fish Tales, “The Lure of the Rainbow” in Fish Nets, “Once Upon a Gnome,” in Strangely Funny, and “Norman’s Skeleton” in All Hallows Evil. She lives on a small farm in NE Ohio with assorted critters: her collie Maggie, two house cats, a canary, two old African ring-necked doves, two ponies, and five rather old hens, plus one loud guinea fowl. She blogs with Writers Who Kill on Thursdays. Http://writerswhokill, blogspot.com. Website: www.gloriaalden.com

Sunday, June 21, 2015

Coal ash dust blowing off Cape Fear plant's coal ash pond near Corinth Rd, photo by Susan Poe, April 3, Good Friday, 2015.***On June 18, 2015, I had the privilege of meeting Esther Calhoun, President of the Black Belt Citizens Fighting for Health and Justice, based in Uniontown, Alabama, which received 4 million+ tons of coal ash from the Kingston, TN. spill of 2008. Esther’s T-shirt read: “I can’t breathe.” She smiled easily. She talked freely. Her message to us here in southeastern Chatham and northern Lee Counties was: “Don’t let it come. Fight it. I wish we had fought harder to stop it. Stick together. Love each other.” With her was Adam Johnston, the Alliance Coordinator for Alabama Rivers, who offered the same message of compassion and love, and also urged us to fight this while we can.Last November we learned that Duke Energy, our state’s only electricity generating company, was planning to transport 12 million tons of coal ash to a Brickhaven clay mine by rail and truck; and to a Colon Road site in Lee County, another 8 million.Our county governments were superseded by state law, though both boards of commissioners voted resolutions not to have it. By June 16, both boards had signed agreements with Duke not to try to stop it. Chatham’s deal even forbids our Board of Commissioners from supporting our citizen organization Chatham Citizens Against Coal Ash Dump, although individual board members, as individuals, are not prevented from speaking out and supporting us.The bald facts remain: coal ash is extremely hazardous, in the air, on the ground, in our drinking water. Both sites are near the Cape Fear River, which provides water to Sanford and for southeast Chatham, and all the towns and cities downstream to the coast: Wilmington, Fayetteville, etc. The rail line passes through the heart of our Moncure community and near homes, farms, and small businesses. The trucks will pass through Pittsboro and down the road I and many others live on: Moncure-Pittsboro–and then down Old #1, New #1, Pea Ridge, Corinth Rd, Moncure-Flatwood Rd. Thousands of people live along these roads. Duke’s contractor, Charah, is planning to wet and spray the coal ash before transporting it, but they don’t plan to cover it. After traveling more than a hundred miles from Charlotte and Wilmington, of course there will be dust blown off the trucks and coal ash dust moves miles on a windy day. It will get into ground water and into people’s lungs. The smaller the particles, the more toxic, and some are so small, you can’t see them. Diseases that occur from coal ash poisoning include COPD, heart, lung, and nerve problems, skin diseases. This dust can be fatal to children and unborn babies quickly. Esther told us she had neuropathy–pain in her arms and legs and numbness. The rail line passed near her home.

Coal Ash mountains in Alabama***The two boards of commissioners have tied their hands. They took the money and say they were planning to spend it to help their citizens. Chatham plans to put in air monitors, but Duke/Charah has proved itself careless of law and environmental regulations and generally unreliable. Duke has 34 coal ash ponds all over North Carolina leaking into our major rivers, where we get our drinking water. Charah’s trucks at the Asheville Airport, as filmed by a Charlotte TV station, had coal ash flying off them after a 3-mile journey. Then only a week after Charah was cited for a sedimentation violation, which didn’t slow them down, the Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) released two of the four permits they need to build the landfills and haul the ash. The last two govern water and allow Charah to destroy the wetlands now existing in these old clay mines: the Army Corps of Engineers 404, and DENR’s 401.Some of us listened to Duke and Charah when our commissioners called them in for questions in open meetings. We heard them claiming how harmless this coal ash would be. They twisted the facts, called these coal ash landfills “clay mine reclamations.” They never gave straight answers. Our citizen researchers discovered how vulnerable the plastic liners are that contain the coal ash–how they can be torn and ripped, have stones poking through, get wrinkles during installation, have faulty seams, plus 12 different kinds of bacteria eat this kind of plastic.We know that the best and safest way to store coal ash is to make salt stone solids from it and store it above ground in concrete bunkers on site. It shouldn’t be moved. Esther’s words echo in my ears: “Fight this. Stick together. Love each other.” Her t-shirt remains in my mind’s eye: “I can’t breathe.” Her steady smile blessed us. Fighting coal ash dumping in my community has become a necessity. I can’t not do this.***

Esther Calhoun, Alabama activist***THE OMENS ARRIVE XIV. June 14, 2015We may live throughour days lulled by forgetfulness, our minds on a myriad of new details, new thingsand people which demand our time and attention. We think we have forgotten,but some memories stay right where weleft them. –The Omens Arrive III., March 15, 2015I’m forgetting you again. I still longfor a letter, but none comes. It’s hardto stay wishful, to hang onto hope.I’m encumbered with delay. Thereare good omens to counterbalancethe dread when I see large-sizedump trucks everywhere I look.“Know your counter-player,” said Erik Erikson. I know mine too well:lies, arrogance, and bluff. Othercorporations and government entitieshave lost money trying to dumpnuclear and other waste where I live,where that rare reality–community–exists. We have the best possiblehelp, and justice is ours. Yet how frailwe are, and how brave. We mustpersist though the sky darkens, the truck traffic worsens and my goodmemories of love found, lost, and foundagain, await resurrection.***

About Me

I write mystery novels, poetry, autobiographical books, reviews and articles. My Hoganvillaea Farm provides about half my food. I sell eggs and figs. My newest book, This River: An Epic Poem is due out from Wild Embers Press in December 2014. My mystery Killer Frost was published by Mainly Murder Press on Sept 1, 2012. Julia Spencer-Fleming rated it "A stellar debut!" Farm Fresh and Fatal was published October 1,2013. Mystery Scene Mag called it "fascinating." You may order both mysteries, my poetry chapbook Beaver Soul (Finishing Line Press, 2013) and This River from me PO Box 253, Moncure, NC 27559 The mysteries cost $17, if you pick up;$20, if mailed. Beaver Soul is $12; $15 if mailed. This River is $15 if picked up, $18 if mailed. My PMZ Poor Woman's Cookbook: Vegetarian Recipes for Survival and Health in the Menopausal and Post-Menopausal Years. $10; $13 if mailed. I hold the copyright to all the material on my blog, which I've written.